Slowing It Down October 24, 2024
“Are you a control freak?” Author Cal Newport paused after reading the inquiry from a listener during an episode of his podcast, Deep Questions. The subtle smackdown that ensued hinted at a history of receiving similar criticisms, and Newport did not...
What Kind of Writer Is ChatGPT? October 04, 2024
Last spring, a graduate student in social anthropology—let’s call him Chris—sat down at his laptop and asked ChatGPT for help with a writing assignment. He pasted a few thousand words, a mix of rough summaries and jotted-down bullet points, into the ...
Another Productivity Hack? June 03, 2024
Everyone wants to get things done, but it can be hard to predict how long they’ll take. Mathematicians needed three centuries to prove Fermat’s Last Theorem—first proposed around 1637, the solution only came in 1994. Was that remarkably fast, or path...